After an early October blanketing of snow, Tahoe resorts - and, presumably, skiers - are hopeful for another early start and late finish of the ski season. Boreal has already opened, and Northstar is making snow as I write this.

Over the past couple of years, the dozen resorts around Lake Tahoe have been engaging in rounds of Melrose Place-like hookups, breakups, rumors and drama. What we're left with is Vail Corp. owning Heavenly Valley and Northstar, and the KSL private equity firm running Squaw and Alpine Meadows, with more potential deals on the way.

This corporate focus on ski development has both advantages and disadvantages for the typical Tahoe weekender. This season visitors will delight in the millions spent on improved lifts, expanded terrain, updated lodges and new on-mountain restaurants. But these developments come at a price, so expect the mountain operators to be working harder than ever to extract every potential dollar from you before, during and after your visits.

New developments

Four years ago, during the height of the real estate bubble, one (non-Tahoe) ski resort marketing head told me: "We're essentially a real estate company with a hill attached. The skiing is almost an afterthought to us now." Tracts of new multimillion-dollar homes, lavish resort villages, and hotels fell onto the hills like an El Niño snowfall. Now that the real estate market has tanked, the resorts are refocusing their efforts on the ski experience. The following are some of the results for this season.

As part of its planned $30 million of resort investments, Northstar has added major new terrain, including 170 acres of advanced gladed "sidecountry" skiing, to the far skier's left on the mountain, off of Sawtooth Ridge and Lookout Mountain, and to the skier's right of the mountain off of Vista chair. Guided tours and snowcat access will be available into these areas.

Northstar has also added a high-speed quad lift to the backside of the mountain, with two new, wide intermediate runs beneath it. Also, a new 500-seat on-mountain restaurant is scheduled to open by Christmas above the Zephyr lift and feature gourmet chow. Northstar partner Heavenly Valley opened their Tamarack Lodge last season, a shiny 15,000-square-foot mid-mountain restaurant, as well as the Boulder Lodge, and this year adds three trails underneath the Stagecoach and Galaxy lifts.

Together, these two Vail resorts are offering the latest version of their social media-driven Epic Mix card, with embedded frequent-skier bonuses and tracking system, with a gaggle of on-mountain photographers available to document your every move. Olympian Shaun White will be making Northstar his "home" mountain for the season, training there and helping to design their new 22-foot half-pipe.

Squaw Valley is in the first phase of its planned $50 million upgrade program, starting with $15 million in improvements to its base area and mid-mountain facilities, with new restaurants and skier services structures. They'll be adding 200 signs (and names!) to the trails, with improved lift condition information boards. Surprisingly, they've actually decreased their lifts, removing underused Mainline, Newport and Pulse, clearing the mountain for future lift expansion. They've also brought in a new team to redevelop their terrain park, which they promise will be epic this year.

Sierra-at-Tahoe will be adding backcountry snowcat skiing, and expanding its tubing park and kids' activities. Kirkwood has expanded its activity centers for both family activities and backcountry adventures. Dodge Ridge has added a T-bar to drag skiers to an additional peak, with more lift improvements coming. Boreal will once again be offering (for a fee) the "BagJump," a 2,500-square-foot inflatable landing pad to absorb the bodies of flailing snowboarders from a huge jump. Bear Valley and Homewood are in the midst of planning major redevelopments.

Good news also for frequent skiers: Virtually every Tahoe resort is offering discount season pass deals and multiticket deals that offer significant savings, assuming you're sure you're going to be on the slopes enough to reap that savings. Vail Corp.'s Epic pass gives unlimited access to their six mountains in Colorado and Tahoe. Now that Squaw and Alpine have merged, they offer a six-pack ticket package for $399, good at both resorts. Check with the resorts, hotels and websites like snowbomb.com for the always-changing deals.

Money, money, money

The increase in on-mountain spending also means an increase in on-mountain costs for skiers, from lift-ticket prices to food services, lessons and rentals. This season, Northstar may be breaking the $100 barrier for walk-up lift ticket price during the holiday season. Their pre-purchased online ticket price during that time is currently "discounted" to a mere $91. Heavenly is close behind with $88 advance-purchase tickets, and Squaw still hasn't released what their increase is going to be from last season's $88 tickets.

If that's not bad enough, to ensure a steadier revenue flow, resorts are trying to lock consumers into purchasing tickets in advance, whether this takes the form of season tickets, multiple ticket packages, or online ordering. Savings is achievable, assuming you actually use the tickets.

Buying in advance means you'll now be accepting the big risk that the mountains are trying to avoid: weather. Say you're up on your spring ski vacation with your prepurchased tickets and it rains the entire week. Congrats, you're now holding hundreds of dollars of worthless paper. Road closures, sick kids, change of plans and you're stuck with your nonrefundable, nontransferable, prepurchased tickets. Try to manage your risk and buy the tickets at these mountains when you arrive, and you'll be paying a premium.

And this price premium is now variable. While we'd all love the flexibility to skip work and ski Mondays, most of us are stuck with weekends and holidays, and this is when many of the resorts increase their prices.

Alternative: old school

Thankfully, with 16 ski resorts in the Lake Tahoe area, skiers still have a great deal of freedom of choice. One of the advantages of Tahoe is the ability to try all these different resorts, a feature you won't want to exercise much if you fork over the money for a season ticket or bulk ticket purchase.

Tahoe's smaller mountains feature far cheaper tickets that you don't have to buy in advance. Yes, the runs are flatter and shorter, the lifts slower and the lodges basic. The lessons, terrain park and cafeteria menu may not match what you get at the more expensive resorts. You won't have social-media add-ins, branded merchandise, trained photographers or dancing mascots. But you will save money, increase your flexibility, and enjoy a throwback style of skiing that's more about a hill and less about a "destination resort experience."

So choose your target as carefully as the hills market to you. If you're worried about weather conditions or changes of plans limiting your skiing, be careful about loading up on prepurchased tickets. For longer trips, be sure to plan ahead to take advantage of lodging-and-lift-ticket packages, particularly in nonpeak times. And if you plan a spur-of-the-moment trip, whatever you do, don't visit one of the big resorts and buy a ticket at the window.